Sprig planting machines are known. For example, see the disclosures in U.S. Pat. No. 6,223,662; U.S. Pat. No. 5,351,634; and U.S. Pat. No. 3,939,785. Additionally, Spriggers Choice, Inc. of Parrott, Ga., has for some years manufactured and sold a no-till sprig machine. Basically, all of these sprig planting machines are similar in a number of respects. First, they include a receiving unit for receiving and holding sprig material to be planted. In some designs the receiving unit is simply a hopper that receives and holds sprig material. In other designs, the sprig planting machine is designed to receive and hold sprig material in a harvested role configuration. In either case, the sprig planting machine carries the supply of sprig material and by utilizing a single conveyor, sprig material is transferred from the hopper or the holding area to a point where the sprig material is discharged on the ground. Sprigs can be broadcast or planted in rows. For the most part, sprig planting machines are particularly designed as broadcast planting machines or as row planting machines. Therefore, in the past, in order to have the capability of both broadcast planting and row crop planting, an operator used two separate machines.
One of the major problems encountered in sprig planting machines is the inability of conventional sprig planting machines to consistently plant a uniform quantity of sprigs. Where the planting is not uniform, it follows that the resulting grass crop will be spotted and less than uniform. There are a number of reasons why it is difficult for sprig planting machines to plant a uniform crop of sprigs. First, sprigs naturally tend to exist in interwoven balls or bundles. Much of this might be attributed to how sprigs are grown and the harvesting methods employed. In any case, the interwoven sprigs tend to be interlocked and difficult to separate. Secondly, as noted above, in cases where the sprig planting machine utilizes a hopper, one often finds that the sprig material about the bottom or lower portion of the hopper is compressed and compact due to the weight of the overlying sprig material. When portions of the sprig material to be planted are compressed and compact, it is much more difficult for the sprig planting machine to fluff and separate the sprig material. Consequently, balls or clumps of compressed and bundled sprigs tend to move through the sprig planting machine untreated, and, as a result, these bundles or balls of sprigs are discharged onto the ground and the result is an ununiform planting.
Finally, sprig planting machines simply have not been designed with the capability of dealing with the inherent nature of sprig material. That is, sprig planting machines of the past have not focused on engaging and separating the sprig material between the receiving or holding area of the supply of sprig material and the ultimate point where the sprig material is discharged by the planting machine. In fact, for the most part, sprig planting machines include one conveyor for conveying the sprig material from a hopper or other holding area to the point of discharge. Often a portion of the single conveyor lies underneath the supply of sprig material to be planted. Consequently, there is little room and little opportunity to engage the sprig material and separate and fluff the material such that the sprig material can be more closely monitored and controlled to achieve a uniform planting or distribution.
Therefore, there is and continues to be a need for a sprig planting machine that is designed to engage and treat the material between the hopper or holding area and the point of discharge such that in the end a uniform quantity of sprig material is continuously discharged from the sprig planting machine as it traverses the ground.